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Abbey Road

Abbey Road was a street which housed various famous music studios. When Owen Harper opened the Rift, the Beatles were seen performing on the roof of their studio in that street. (TV: End of Days)

When Lenny Kruger replaced the Beatles with them, the Common Men had "a great photo" taken there in either 1966 or '67. (AUDIO: 1963: Fanfare for the Common Men)

Behind the scenes

Abbey road

Full promo image for 1963: Fanfare for the Common Men

The cover of AUDIO: 1963: Fanfare for the Common Men has an homage to the Abbey Road album cover. A full version was also released as a promotional image. Similarly, the Bridgit Connell variant cover of the first issue of the Doctor Who: The Thirteenth Doctor comic series featured the cast in the poses of the band.

On 19 September 2015, the same day the first episode of Series 9 of Doctor Who premiered, Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman performed a spoof of the famous cover of the Abbey Road album, featuring them as the Twelfth Doctor and Clara Oswald, alongside two Daleks. The Doctor is in front, taking the same position as John Lennon, hands in his pockets, with his sonic sunglasses on. Clara can be seen in Paul McCartney's position, barefoot and pointing at her feet. In the background is a Volkswagen Beetle bearing the license plate "DWW 29IF".

Doctor_Who_on_Abbey_Road_Photoshoot

Doctor Who on Abbey Road Photoshoot

A bespectacled Peter Capaldi and a barefooted Jenna Coleman, with two Daleks, mimic the famous Abbey Road album cover by the Beatles.

The photo shoot also seemed to parody the urban legend surrounding the original album cover that there was symbolism indicating Paul McCartney had died. Clara had bare feet like Paul, and Paul's lack of shoes was taken as a sign he had expired - something that actually happens to Clara in Series 9. Furthermore, the "DWW 29IF" license plate on the Volkswagen was interpreted as "Doctor Who Weeps", and symbolically, Clara would be "29 if" she had lived, similar to the "LMW 28IF" Volkswagen license seen on the Beatles album that was interpreted as "Linda McCartney Weeps" and Paul would be "28 if" he had lived.

A video of the shoot was later posted online to the official Doctor Who YouTube channel, which revealed that the shoot required several takes, and was completed in 1 minute and 18 seconds (likely done quickly to avoid causing too much of a traffic jam). It also showed that Jenna had shown discomfort in stepping on the asphalt in her bare feet, constantly remaining on tiptoe during the shoot, and as soon as the shoot ended, she scampered over to the nearby sidewalk, where a crew member immediately brought Jenna her shoes to help her put them back them on. In addition, the crew struggled to move the cumbersome Dalek props on and off the Abbey Road crossing several times and out of the way of oncoming cars, with audible groans from one of the props as it got caught on the brick pavement, and Peter briefly tried to assist two crewmen to push one of the Dalek props off the street right after the shoot came to an end.

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